thisbluespirit | (no subject)

Sorry about all the political posts yesterday, when I usually avoid such things in fannish spaces, but yesterday was exceptional. It's not every day you wake up to find out that not only have we voted to leave the EU, but that the PM has resigned, the Opposition are calling for a vote of no confidence in their leader, Scotland and Ireland are making plans to leave the UK and the economy has crashed. It's a shock. I feel like a small alien walking around in my north east town full of flags hanging out of houses, and I'm British. (I think. It's a bit hard to tell suddenly.) (I was trying to remind myself it might be for Euro 2016, but they weren't there last time, and then extra Union Jacks appeared. Oh, the irony.)

The point of this post being really, I'm sorry! Fannishness and cheer will now resume (I hope) while my country takes a few weeks/months/years to figure out what comes next (politics is mostly v slow) and hopefully we'll all work to make things get better. And I have a hurt/comfort bingo table to work on ~~while the country falls apart~~, which seems vaguely appropriate...

But for the moment: I just don't know or recognise my country any more. I don't know what it is or will be. I didn't know I could feel like that. It's unhelpful, but it's true. What may come may be good, but for today I am very sad - for me and for everybody else who didn't want this, especially those who didn't even get a say and who have now been made to feel afraid and unwanted here. <<♥>>

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You don't need to apologize. When your country makes a decision that will have global political and economic repercussions for years to come, you have every right to vent. Particularly when it was a decision influenced by extremists playing on ignorance and fear. Here in the US, our elections tend to go that way far too often, and I'm very scared that my country will make the same mistake in November. The rise of racist, xenophobic politicians playing on fear seems now to be global phenomenon, and that is very frightening.

My hope is that people everywhere see Brexit as a warning, and that those who were ignorant and indifferent are woken-up the the reality that ignorance and indifference will have real-life consequences for them, and join the rest of us in fighting politics motivated by hate & fear. *crosses fingers*

I hope things somehow turn out better than what we expect, but in the meanwhile- *HUGS*

And if you're looking for fannish distraction, have you heard about Big Finish having a short story contest? The winning entry gets recorded as a Short Trip read by Nick Briggs! I'm still toying with giving it a try, even though the submission deadline is in a few days- a good excuse to sit down and write!

Thank you! It is just incredibly scary to know that we might have irrevocably broken our country and all through sheer needless stupidity. I hope things turn out okay too, somehow, some way but right now nobody knows and I'm just oscillating between horror and grief and anger.

It is not fun to be the dire warning to the rest of the world. Useful, but nobody wants to be it. /o\

Oh dear, I hope that didn't sound awful! I don't mean AT ALL that I'm in any way glad that this happened to Britain. I just find it a helpful coping mechanism when you can't undo something to tell yourself that people can learn from their mistake, and to hope they can still do better next time. But it would definitely be far preferable never to have made the first mistake at all. O_o

Don't worry - I didn't for a minute think you meant it that way, but I definitely never wanted to have to point to Britain as a terrible Warning of anything, really. I think we're all hoping we can at least learn from it and move on, although the fact that all our leaders seem more interested in still playing power games rather than addressing the situation doesn't fill me with confidence right now.